Carolyn Hax: 42 and pregnant but husband doesn't want baby

DEAR CAROLYN: I found out a few weeks ago that I am pregnant at 42! I have one child, almost 8, who is a complete joy.

My husband has made it quite clear that he does not want this baby because it was not planned and he doesn't want to work forever. I feel it is a miracle after four years of fertility treatments and finally giving up two years ago.

I don't want to be selfish, but I really want this baby. But then I keep seeing moms with kids and wondering whether if it is selfish to be so old with a young child and to go against what my husband wants.

Friends who know my struggle are very excited … he has told no one.

I cry a lot of nights.

DEAR 42: He wants his wife to abort a child she has ached for six years to conceive. And you're the one worried you're selfish?

Does this originate in you, the state of mind that does not even entertain that it's equally selfish of him to "go against" what you want? Does it originate in him? In your dynamic together?

Allow me to note that I dwell comfortably in the gray areas of child-bearing, out of respect for the fact that no one can know – or has any business dictating – what is right for each prospective parent and child.

But this is, again, a yearned-for child who is already on the way – courtesy of parents who, two years ago, used fertility treatments.

You got "so old" since then? When you gaze upon those "moms with kids," can you peg their ages to within a two-year margin of error?

There are, certainly, practical considerations here that outrage won't solve. An obvious and painful one is your 8-year-old, who stands to lose a (presumably) stable, intact home to this standoff. There's also always a chance your baby will have special needs – especially given the higher risks associated with the gently phrased "advanced" maternal (and paternal) age – and that has to factor into any responsible calculations about having this child as a single mom.

There's also the sad irony of your husband's priorities. If he leaves the marriage over his retirement-age stance, and if you choose to bear the child, then you're both looking at the added financial strain of maintaining two households plus a baby – meaning he'd better serve his interests by staying. Would he, then? Would he be a loving or grudging dad?

None of these considerations comes into play, though, until you wrestle with the baseline question you need to answer: Is there any reason to terminate this pregnancy that you consider legitimate?

Forget (somehow) all the specifics of your current bind and answer that question on its own merits, as if it were a hypothetical. Sleep on the question, cry on it, even talk to trusted advisers: friends, clergy, obstetrician, mental-health professionals.

This is, I believe, the only way you can live with yourself after making your decision – whatever that decision may be.

Then work on the question about your dynamic that I posed earlier.

Then share your conclusions with your husband, thereby presenting him a clear menu from which to choose his next move. A reputable, professional, outside adviser also makes sense at this stage, too, should emotions put productive discussion out of reach.

Ideally, of course, you'd write this menu together. Conception doesn't work that way, though; call it unfair or call it biology, your husband had his say when he slept with you. In the mother's body alone is where the last word resides.

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